Political donations by parties in works

Reluctant ethics panel OKs recommendation

OVERVIEW

Background: A federal judge ordered the city to lift its 37-year-old ban on campaign contributions from political parties in a ruling last month.

What’s changing: The city’s Ethics Commission has recommended placing a $1,000 cap on party contributions to candidates — double the $500 limit for individual donors.

The future: The recommendation will be considered by the City Council, but it’s unclear whether any change will go into effect before the June 8 election.

San Diego  Political parties would be able to contribute $1,000 to candidates in San Diego city races under a recommendation approved by the city’s Ethics Commission.

The ethics panel reluctantly proposed the contribution limit in response to a federal judge’s ruling last month that the city must allow parties to donate to candidates. Party contributions have been banned since 1973, and the current law allows only individual donors to give $500 to a candidate per election.

Commissioner Gil Cabrera said he disagrees with the court ruling and wants to keep the limit as low as possible to prevent parties from having a major influence on elections.

“I’m troubled by the tendency that I’m seeing from the courts to allow more and more money into our political process,” he said. “It, at the very least, encourages those watching the political process from the side to be apathetic and believe that moneyed interests control the political and governmental process. So it is my intention to resist that tendency with every fiber of my being.”

Cabrera said he prefers forcing the court to “drag us kicking and screaming” on the way to higher limits for parties. He then proposed the $1,000 cap, which the panel approved on a 4-1 vote Thursday night.

Until now, party influence has been largely limited to symbolic endorsements and indirect financial support, such as creating a campaign mailer that promotes multiple candidates or issues. Those mailers cannot be made in coordination with the candidate, however.

Simon Mayeski, a member of California Common Cause’s San Diego chapter, said he doesn’t see a compelling reason why political parties should be able to contribute.

“It doesn’t make any sense to allow me to double and triple or even higher-multiple my donation just because I shovel it through a political party,” Mayeski said. “That, to me, gives the opportunity for corruption or suspicion of corruption, which is just as bad.”

The city doesn’t really have any choice but to create a new limit for parties.

U.S. District Judge Irma Gonzalez issued a preliminary ruling last month that struck down several city campaign laws and ordered San Diego to lift its ban on political parties. She did, however, say parties can’t contribute until the city creates an appropriate limit, which she suggested should be higher than $500.

The ruling was in response to a lawsuit filed in December by the county Republican Party and a coalition of supporters to force the city to loosen a range of campaign-finance rules for city races.

Two ethics commissioners, Lee Biddle and Larry Westfall, questioned why the judge made an exception for parties.